by Ian Irvine
Nine Merdrun soldiers were sprawled on the floor as if they had been dumped there from a height. Two were still moving but neither could get up. To their left loomed a construct akin to the one Karan had used to carry them to the future, though this one was far larger, and a slender metal ladder ran up the side.
Aviel crept around the shadowed base of the left-hand wall, keeping as far from Maigraith as possible. She was staring at the construct in dismay; clearly, she had not known of its existence. Perhaps she feared that Lirriam was inside and Rulke was planning on leaving with her. Aviel hoped so; it would serve Maigraith right.
The construct rose a few feet, dropped and hit the floor with a crash that shook the walls. Again it rose, six feet this time, fell, and the impact opened a crack across the floor. The left-hand half of the floor, on which the construct stood, tilted and one of the bodies slid down and fell through the crack. Maigraith let out a shrill cry. The floor tilted back and the construct settled.
Near the bottom of the ladder a big man rose unsteadily into the light, then crawled behind the remaining bodies. Skald, though he was a shaking, bloody wreck. Aviel glanced at Maigraith, who was gazing yearningly at the top of the construct and did not appear to have noticed him.
Aviel was too low down to see into it. She edged along the side wall to a metal staircase that spiralled up to a door near the ceiling, and crept up until she was above the top of the construct. Rulke was at the controls. Llian, the big-eared sus-magiz and the female slave were inside.
Where was Lirriam?
The sky galleon landed hard in the clearing near Alcifer. Karan, Flydd, Nish and Maelys raced to the enormous front doors and Karan pounded on them with the hilt of her knife. It made little sound on the thick metal. She grabbed a chunk of fallen stone and slammed it into the door.
‘Rulke, let us in!’ The soft sandstone crumbled. She tossed it aside.
‘He could be half a mile away,’ said Flydd. ‘He’ll never hear us.’
The ground shook, and a few seconds later Karan heard a distant crash. ‘What was that?’
‘Sounded like the top fell off one of the towers,’ said Nish.
‘We’ve got to get in,’ said Flydd.
‘Can you blast the doors in?’
‘You greatly overestimate my powers.’ There came another shudder and another crash, louder than the first.
Flydd turned, looking back the way they had come. ‘Get out of the way. Well away!’ He ran down the path.
‘What’s he doing?’ said Karan.
Nish pulled her aside. ‘I’d have thought that was obvious.’
Shortly the sky galleon soared over the trees, dipped, raced along the broad path, a few feet up, and hit the doors at the speed of a cantering horse. They burst in.
Flydd moved the sky galleon backwards. Metal screamed and tore, and the left door fell off its hinges and hit the paved path with an almighty clang. The right door was dragged backwards down the path for twenty feet.
He slammed the sky galleon down and scrambled over the side. ‘Come on!’
They raced after him, down an immense hall, too dark to see much, and left up a broad, curving white staircase. ‘Sounded like it came from up here.’
Considering he had recently recovered from Skald’s assassination attempt, Flydd was remarkably quick. Karan started to run up the stairs, but pain shot through her left hip and she had to slow to a hobble. Nish passed her, taking three steps at a time.
Maelys came up beside Karan. ‘Need a hand?’
There was another crash, louder and closer. ‘No,’ she panted. ‘Yes! I’m really worried. About Llian. He’s … not good in a fight.’
Maelys gave Karan her shoulder and she managed a bit more speed. Several flights up they reached another corridor, turned a corner and passed into a large open area, dimly lit by moonlight coming through an enormous skylight. They were on a long balcony overlooking a hall large enough to accommodate a thousand people.
‘I don’t believe it!’ whispered Flydd. ‘Why didn’t he say anything?’
‘Maybe, after all this time, he wasn’t sure it would still work,’ said Nish.
Karan looked over. ‘Rulke made two constructs.’
‘And the big one has been hidden here all this time.’
‘I heard long ago that the whole city of Alcifer was a construct –’
‘So did I,’ said Flydd, ‘though I never believed such a thing was possible. And it wasn’t. So that’s what he’s been up to for the past month – getting this beautiful craft ready to defeat the bloody bastard Merdrun. Oh, this is glorious! With Rulke and that construct we can win the war.’
The key to happiness is always to hope, and never to expect, Karan remembered Persia saying in Roros.
56
Hit The Bastard!
Skald lay prone behind the bodies of his troops, longing to join them in death.
A slim figure flitted through the deep shadows on the far side of the hall and stopped, staring upwards in an attitude of despair. It had to be Maigraith. Rulke would not see her from the construct, though she might see his head and shoulders through the portholes.
She had no way of knowing that Lirriam had been gated to Skyrock. She probably assumed that she was in the construct, about to escape with Rulke. Maigraith would try to prevent it.
The construct rose a few yards and hovered. She extended a thin arm towards it. Was she planning to kill him, in a jealous rage? No, she was far too controlled, and far too obsessed with him.
Skald was crawling backwards when a creamy glow formed at Maigraith’s fingertips, zipped up, and Rulke’s head was driven backwards as if he had been punched in the jaw. But the air between him and Maigraith rippled like a mirage and she fell to one knee, mouth opening and closing. Her attack had set off a counterattack.
The construct dropped, hitting so hard that the whole building shook. The floor cracked in front of Skald at an angle to the main crack and a triangular section fell through, carrying the rest of his troops with it. If he had not moved it would have taken him too.
The construct tilted sharply and he saw into the cabin as Rulke toppled off his seat, evidently stunned by Maigraith’s attack. He landed on Llian, who went down as well, but the construct righted itself and Skald could no longer see them.
Nor Maigraith. He prayed that she had fallen through the broken floor.
Then he saw a chance to tear victory from the hooked fingers of death – if he could get inside before Rulke recovered. He scanned the hall more closely. Maigraith was doubled up near the side wall, heaving.
Skald reached the ladder and dragged himself up, spitting blood, and in through the side hatch. He was at the round end of an egg-shaped cabin, dimly lit by dark red light coming from strips set in the walls and ceiling. Directly ahead, the seat Rulke had fallen off was made of curved copper, with narrow slots in the base and sides, and a high backrest of serpentinite, the green rock polished to an oily sheen. Another seat, a plain one made of white metal, was fixed to the floor beside it.
Skald assessed the threat. Rulke lay on his face, unmoving. Llian was on hands and knees, swaying, dazed. Maigraith’s stunning spell must have clipped him. Tiaan stood six yards away at the pointy end of the cabin. Sus-magiz Ghiv was tied to a ring embedded in the wall beside her.
In front of the copper seat, a black metal stalk sprouted from the floor and spread out to a yard across at the top, like a mushroom with a bite out of it. Two glassy plates covered most of the top. A third, smaller plate was set in the bite. Coloured lights, shapes and patterns danced across each plate. Between the bite and the copper seat a thick grey tube rose from the floor, curving towards the seat and branching into five control rods, each ending in a knob carved from a different kind of rock.
‘How did Rulke get free?’ choked Skald. He had to know.
‘I called the guard away,’ said Llian, and smirked.
Skald wanted to blast him dead but dared not waste the power. He would n
ot have thought the pain could get worse, but it had. He grabbed a handle on the wall, clung to it and cast an endurance spell on himself. It made no difference.
Llian struggled to his feet.
‘Stay back,’ said Skald, ‘or die.’
Llian laughed mockingly.
Not even this fool is afraid of me. How did it come to this? Skald blasted at him, so feebly that Llian only slipped to one knee.
Skald was failing rapidly. He stumbled to Rulke, knelt on his back and put his hands around the Charon’s throat. Could he drink Rulke’s life? What a feat that would be; what a life! With that much power he might even heal himself, and if he got back to Skyrock he would suck the magiz as dry as the corpses left behind at the Sink of Despair.
He checked on Tiaan, whose eyes were dark, staring holes now. Her mouth was twisted in horror. Or was it terror?
It took all Skald had to initiate the life-drinking spell, but nothing happened. Had he failed? He tried again, the spell went to completion, and power surged out of Rulke’s chest and into Skald.
Immense power. Every blood vessel burned as if his heart pumped molten metal; every nerve fibre stung like the touch of a red-hot wire. So much power that he was temporarily paralysed.
But the spell must have erased Maigraith’s stunning charm, because Rulke roused and heaved Skald off. Rulke tried to get up but Skald’s spell had its hooks deep in him now and he fell down on his back, shuddering violently.
‘Llian?’ he choked. ‘Tiaan? Do something, or we’re all dead!’
Llian rose but just stood there, not knowing what to do. Tiaan ran to Rulke, whose heels were drumming on the metal floor. Skald tried to ward her away but the scalding power flowing into him would not allow him to move.
She scrambled under the mushroom-shaped control binnacle, looking up. Hidden lights made red and yellow patterns on her face, constantly changing. She reached up with both hands, twisted and pulled out a mechanism.
The light was too dim for Skald to see it clearly though it contained a variety of crystals, a pair of wire coils and three glass flasks, one half full of quicksilver, the second containing a swirling green gas and the third, shaped like the bottom half of an hourglass, a red powder. He watched dumbly; he had no idea what they were for and could not guess what Tiaan intended.
She touched one crystal, then another and another, her long fingers caressing the facets of each before moving on. She started, bent and plucked a long, blade-like orange crystal free. At her touch, a series of glyphs on one crystal face lit a brighter orange.
She ran to Rulke and slammed the point of the crystal down against his bare chest, between two ribs. It went in half an inch and he arched up so that only his head, shoulders and heels touched the floor.
Pain speared through Skald. What was she doing? What would happen if Rulke was killed in the middle of the life-drinking? Skald could not bear to think. Neither could he move.
Tiaan pushed the crystal in a bit further, mouthing a spell unfamiliar to Skald. Geomancy, he assumed. The crystal glowed like the inside of a furnace, the orange light streaming between her fingers, then she wrenched it out and the link of the life-drinking spell came with it, causing flames to flicker around her fingers. She whirled and hurled the crystal backhanded at Skald. It dug into his forehead and the link attempted to attach to him.
He could not go through that again. He knocked the crystal aside and tried desperately to block the spell. It took most of the power he had drawn from Rulke. His forehead throbbed and he felt a curving welt across his Merdrun glyph, like a deep burn. The spell tried to reattach. Again he blocked it, draining himself further. It was hard to move now. Hard to think, for his blood vessels flowed ice and his nerve fibres were numb.
If Rulke recovered, it was all over. Skald had to find more power, but Llian was not magically gifted and would not hold much, and what Tiaan had just done meant she was too valuable. Attacking Rulke again was out of the question. It had to be Ghiv.
Skald cast the life-drinking spell, which was still trying to embed itself in him, at the helpless sus-magiz. Ghiv was too inexperienced to defend himself and slumped in his bonds, eyes accusing, mouth gaping, as Skald tore his life from him. It was a monstrous betrayal of one of his own, but necessary. One for All!
Rulke was rising. Skald had to finish him now or he never would. He went at Rulke again and they wrestled like old men, lurching and staggering and cursing feebly, each trying to use disabling spells on the other with what little strength they had. Skald tried to knee Rulke in the groin. Rulke blocked it with his own knee and head-butted Skald across the welt on his temple. Agony speared through him.
From the corner of an eye Skald saw Llian coming, carrying the leg of a wooden table. It looked heavy enough to brain Skald.
‘Hit the bastard!’ said Rulke. ‘Stove his head in.’
Llian danced around them, the table leg upraised, but afraid to swing because Rulke and Skald were too close together. Skald dared not attack Llian. If he did, Rulke would defeat him in a moment.
‘Chronicler!’ gasped Rulke. He was staggering, almost falling, but he managed to heave Skald around. ‘Hit him now!’
Llian swung the club with all his strength and Skald knew he could not avoid it. But as he swung, Rulke stumbled and fell into the path of the club, which thudded into the top of his head.
‘This how you convince me to give you our tale?’ Rulke said thickly, and fell to the floor, unconscious.
‘Hit Skald, you cretin!’ shrieked Tiaan.
Skald could barely stand up. He felt so very weak. Llian swung the table leg. Skald ducked, a trifle late, and it glanced off the side of his head. A painful blow but not enough to bring him down. Llian swung again. Skald fended it off with his forearm, losing a long strip of hairy skin. He was failing fast but could not allow himself to be beaten by such an oaf.
Llian, slightly off-balance, raised the club once more and Skald knew he could not avoid it. He stumbled forwards, bent at the knees, then drove his head up under Llian’s chin, hurling him onto his back. His head hit the floor, and he lay there, blood running from a corner of his mouth.
Skald kicked the club out of his hand, bound and gagged Rulke and went back to Tiaan, who looked terrified now. And well she might be. If Skald was going to die, he would take all his enemies with him.
He slumped over, gasping. ‘How – you do that?’
She looked blank.
‘How did you eject the life-drinking spell? Speak or die!’ said Skald.
Her brown eyes showed the blank desperation of a slave who had seen too many slaves killed, knew she was going to be next, and could do nothing about it. ‘Once a geomancer, always a geomancer,’ she said. ‘I was the best.’
‘Can you fly this craft?’
Hope flared in her eyes but faded just as quickly. He pointed to the copper seat. She sat on it.
‘Th-the controls look – similar to thapters I once flew,’ she whispered.
‘Then fly it!’
She did not move.
‘Or die.’
She looked around for the orange crystal, retrieved it, wiped Rulke’s blood off and reinserted it in the mechanism. Her fingers worked mechanically, her mind elsewhere. She put the mechanism back where it came from. ‘Th-this construct is much – bigger. I may not be strong enough.’
Skald stood beside her, supporting himself on the white seat. ‘Once you’ve learned how to fly, how could you forget?’
‘You’re a fool!’ she snapped. But the flash of spirit died. ‘Knowing how to fly is the easy part. B-but coordinating mind and hands – and eyes – takes a lot of practice. I haven’t flown in fourteen years. Besides –’
‘What?’ Skald could allow nothing to thwart him.
‘Drawing great power through a controller burns the mind. Y-you develop protective scars when you do a lot of flying … But they fade.’
‘You’re saying that even if hand and eye can control this huge craft, the power may
burn your mind so badly that –’
‘Yes,’ she said with a disturbing hint of satisfaction.
Was she telling the truth? Or exaggerating the difficulty, hoping she could seize the construct if he weakened? Skald could not tell. He had to find a way to control her.
‘Llian,’ he said. ‘Sit with Tiaan. If she falters, hold her up.’
Llian rose shakily and sat on the seat to Tiaan’s right. She leaned forwards on the copper seat and took hold of the black and green knobs, eyes closed. Nothing happened. She lifted her left hand, touched the red knob, then the blue-white one, and settled on the last, the sulphur-yellow knob, which she pulled towards her. The patterns of light on the glassy plates went out, reappeared, and a hum emanated from the belly of the construct.
‘What are you doing?’ said Skald.
‘Sensing my way into the controller, so we can become one.’
Truth or lie? He could not tell. ‘How long will that take?’
Tiaan shrugged. ‘I’ve never flown anything this big before. But if I get it wrong, and the mechanism fails while we’re flying …’
Skald relived the thapter plummeting from the sky, smashing to bits on that desert hilltop and burning so fiercely that the rocks beneath it must have melted. Dare he trust the True Purpose to a woman who had not flown in fourteen years, might not have the strength for it, and could well take the noble way out if she realised she was never going to see her children again?
It was Tiaan or nothing. Tiaan or failure and unbearable shame. He had to make it worth her while.
‘Get us to Skyrock,’ he croaked, ‘and I will personally see that you are sent home, unharmed, to your children.’
She turned warily, though her eyes glowed with an impossible hope. ‘On your word?’
‘By our sacred True Purpose, I do so swear.’
57
I Don’t Care If I Die